When I was around 10 or 11, I received my big bro's hand-me-down Tandy along with a BIG box of Sierra games. I had never even heard of Sierra prior to getting those amazing treasures. The very first game I went for was King's Quest IV. Why?? Because I'm a girl and I had NEVER seen a heroine before take the lead in a game! I was enamored. To this DAY I still think back on this game fondly. Although the rest of the King's Quest series certainly doesn't pale in comparison. What a series! I would recommend it to anyone who hasn't played!
Weird that Genesta can sense if Rosella forgot the fruit, yet still sends her home anyway. Couldn't she just teleport over to the swamp and get it for her?
This was my first King's Quest game. I remember how lethal the stairs were well. They taught me to save scum hard. Then I learned to make many save files after I saved in an unwinnable state.
That whale puzzle was the bane of my existence as a kid. Even visits to the Sierra forums were of no help, since no one mentioned that you had to be captured by Lolotte before the whale would even appear. I do like this game a lot of the atmosphere and innovations in technology and storytelling, but it was the one that most grated on me in my recent replay of the series. All those trial and error stairways, narrow paths, and unavoidable troll in the caves really left a bad taste in my mouth. One thing I did notice was how much shady business Rosella had to do on Lolotte's behalf, and how the game rewards you for undoing it after she is dead (releasing the unicorn, returning the scarab to the tomb, etc). It's a nice little touch and one I completely missed playing this as a kid.
"Tamir" in Hebrew (and some other ME languages) means "hidden"... gotta wonder if they used Tolkien's style of playing on real languages in their fantasy world. Either way, one of my favorite series ever! 💙👍
I just finished playing this game (as in today). First time I had touched it in close to twenty years! Forgot how brutal and unforgiving these games can be at times, but it's well worth it for the quality. The entire King's Quest Collection is up on Steam for only 20 bucks!
This was actually the first point n click I ever got to play, a neighbor had it when I was young. I still remember turning into a frog and the text box "POOF! You're a little froggy!"
Text parser based graphic adventure games should make a comeback! I find them way more immersive than point & click games. The very first graphic adventure game I played and which got me into the genre as a kid was Simon the Sorcerer, a P&C graphic adventure. Only last year I was finally in a state of mind which enabled me to tackle the earlier Sierra games, such as KQ 1-4 and Space Quest 1-3. I would never have thought I'd be able to get into them, but turns out it's been an awesome experience discovering and playing these games for the very first time. Wish there were either more of them or I could erase my memory and experience them for the first time again. :(
These games really do seem like a fairy tale come to life. The art style, story, and especially that soundtrack. It's amazing to me as a composer just how much character they really could create with such a limited technology. Creation through constraint, indeed.
Yeah, that version of Greensleeves was pretty bad... BUT it was still enough to save a special place in my heart for that song. So much that I demanded that at one point during my wedding, I insisted that Greensleeves be played before the ceremony begun. My wife wasn't too thrilled when she learned where my love for that song came from and she realized that music from a video game had been played at her wedding. I still don't see anything wrong with that. This is my favorite King's Quest game. KQ2 was my first PC game, but KQ4 was my favorite of the series.
King's Quest 4 has to be one of the better King's Quest, it still has its problems design wise and is filled with deaths but over all it comes out near the top of the series in my opinion.
I think it's probably the second best after Kings Quest VI, despite the design improvements of KQV. But the first Kings Quest game I played was VII, so that explains why I was strangely drawn to it when I got Kings Quest Collection.
As I recall, the original release of King's Quest (on self-booting floppy) featured a consistent "chirping" sound throughout the game, which was absent in later releases.
I loved Kings Quest games so much. IV is epecially nostalgic for me, as I used to play it with my mother (well she would play it and I would 'help' sometimes as my spelling at age 8 was not great lol) and I think it was probably one of the first games I ever encountered with a woman protagonist. I went back recently to play it on an emulator and felt it held up. These games just...meant a lot and I'm glad to see someone talking about them! Also I love your channel in general! Glad to have found it!
When you mentioned how this game had many 1st's, I thought one of the main game release introductions would be the fact that this is the 1st Sierra game created with the SCI engine which I am so thankful for and ill be honest pre SCI releases I have never been crazy about and since I was born in '88 a lot of Sierra games before late '92 I did not experience during their contemporary distribution era
The whale...THE WHALE! How I was confounded by that whale. ...then I found out that you don't need to climb to the center of the tongue. You just want to reach the top so you can walk over to the uvula. Huh. Also, Space Quest reference in a bottle, LOL.
I was never able to get through the game, but the setting and the house cleaning (not kidding) made this is one of the adventure games I love the most. I love VI and VII as well. The King's quest series was filled with bollocks puzzles and some garbage design, but I still cherish the games so, so much. I'm so happy that there are content creators like you out there showing these games to the world so many years later.
Finally, your video acted as a reminder that there as in fact an AGI version of KQ4. I kept forgetting to look it up, but as soon as you showed it on screen I went looking. And I found it! Looks awesome! AGI FTW!
I think you're spot on about the sombre mood of this game. I came to King's Quest as a kid with II, then III which blew my mind with the time/spell element and then I got IV when I was 9, a bit after it came out. The music and everything just really blew my mind and I admit, at the time, I found it a terribly emotionally involving game. I hate to admit that now--as an adult and as someone who has played the more recent games, that probably wouldn't be true, but... I also found the transition to night terribly spooky, even genuinely scary (did I mention I scared *really* easily as a kid? I'd have nightmares from seeing a Nightmare on Elm Street video cover...)
One of my faves of the series. Got it for Xmas one year and played all school break mostly during a blizzard. Hadn't heard the MT-32 soundtrack until now, it's quite nice (I had one of the FM cards).
This was one of the King's Quest games I didn't play until my late teens, when I got the King's Quest Complete Collection, and thank God I didn't play it as a child. Nighttime in Tamir is genuinely creepy, and I died more than my fair share of times. I do love it though, and it makes me love Rosella (who I only knew previously from King's Quest VII).
Sierra games always came with a little catalogue of their other games and I remember thinking that the screenshots of KQ4 were just mind blowing. Still looks good!
Not only was this my first King's Quest games, but the first PC game I ever played. My sister and I spent months finishing the game without a walkthrough. Such great memories.
I LOVED playing this game back when it came out. I remember experiencing some hilarious glitches like being able to walk in the sky on the path scene to Lolotte's castle, and the troll in the dark cave being frozen and doesn't chase you.
@Roses - Really glad you reviewed this one - This is my all-time favourite KQ game (and possibly favourite Sierra game overall). It has always blown me away with it's rich, fairy-tale and folklore world, it's many puzzles - some really good ones, it's range of characters... dammit there's so much. The haunted house, with the ghosts and the zombies in the graveyard outside, is by far my favourite section of any KQ game, to this day I still love it. KQ4 feels much more like a "solid" adventure game (the first two were okay but kinda 'bitty' in places), and whilst it has the odd minor moment of humour is indeed more serious over the goofier early ones (heck, the Batmobile ven cames racing out of a cave in I think KQ2!) I also personally feel it's one of those games that benefits for the text input in terms of scope for exploring and experimenting. As with all Sierra games there is lots of saving, learning-by-error and points where if you don't have right items in some places you're stuffed and have to restore, but meh, that's part of Sierra. Yes that dark cave was terrible (I actually thought when originally playing it that I had missed something either in it or something to make it easier... nope) and yes I spent AGES trying to climb up that damned whale's tongue! Whilst KQ6 and, for it's drawbacks (hoot) KQ5 are too classics, in my view this is THE best King's Quest game and a wistful memory of the golden age of adventure games. (Oh and if you don't like He-Man haircuts I'm kinda stuffed really. BTW, would really love some similar Space Quest reviews) :)
I'm so glad I found your channel :) AWESOME content. It's a treasure trove for showcasing games I love and grew up with! Finalllyyy. This is a cozy corner of youtube. And the presentation is 10/10, so fun and entertaining. I'm literally giddy over all this. YAY.
I wish AGD would remake this one too. Regarding dithering I wonder how that looked back then, if colors were blended like on old consoles? That would make the technique look better, especially on a larger monitor.
It pretty much always looked badly dithered, at least if you were using a VGA monitor (as I was at the time). Perhaps a little bit better than it looks with modern, upscaled LCD displays, but nothing like the noise/blending you'd get with an RF or composite TV connection like you'd find with old consoles (low-rent anti-aliasing, as I used to call it). Much older games, written for CGA graphics (as opposed to later EGA or VGA graphics) were frequently designed to be displayed on television or CGA monitors with a composite video cable, and you would get the blending effect on those (and it typically looked far better than the sickly pinkish hue you'd get with backwards-compatible EGA/VGA displays), but that wouldn't apply to _King's Quest IV_, which uses EGA graphics.
I played it on a Commodore Amiga with a CRT, and it looked pretty good. These days you can use SCUMMVM to translate the dither patterns into actual colors.
Roses , I blame you for buying the humble bundle of Sierra adventure games. I know the decision was mine, and all that, but your videos about King's Quest have influenced me. They are great and your channel is great. Keep the good work!
I'm surprised you didn't mention the randomness of the cave troll! It has to be the most unnerving stressful moment in the whole game. Gotta hate unscripted moments like that. It's like those random deaths in Gold Rush, another Sierra game. But all in all, I love KQ4 as much as you do. Roberta Williams' badly digitized face when you expire has to be the scariest thing in the whole game, though.
I love this game! It's frustrating, it makes me angry sometimes... But man, the journey is just soo damn special, I don't think I'll ever forget this game. ^^
The game allows you to use the mouse for point and click movement. And then puts a thousand and one narrow paths to make you fall off when Rosella just walks in a straight line wherever you click. Ah, the memories of tapping the directional arrows slowly just to move up some simple stairs...
I started playing all the King's Quest games after picking up the Sierra bundle. I while I was very impressed with the first one, just considering the time it came out, IV was the first one that really blew me away. All the animation and music was much improved from III and they added a bunch of dialogue scenes. Pretty cool! Also Rosella is awesome in this one. I liked playing her in VII, but she was a bit too whiny, at least at the beginning.
Graham wasn´z playing who is the favoruite child. The scene with his hat is more likely to celebrate their future, hoping they will have great aventures as he had, that is why he passes the hat on to this children.
This is still my favorite King's Quest title out of the five I've played. I remember being so excited finding it at the mall as a kid and begging my mom to buy it for me, lol.
Hello PushingUpRoses, it's been a real pleasure watching your reviews of these great Sierra Games. I also played these games out of order - without a strategy guide or calling the 900 Sierra help line (wow phone bills back then). I played II, III, I, then IV, V and the last one I played in the series was VI, then I moved onto Police Quest, Space Quest, and eventually Man Hunter (which I never completed - I was lost). I am reaching out because I can't seem to find "ANY PROOF" of one of my childhood memories about this specific Kings Quest Game ... and I have searched ever place I can think of online. So maybe you know this: In the beginning of this story (aka the Intro cut scene) I remember the player having a choice of being disguised by Genesta. If you chose not to be disguised then the Frog Prince wasn't such a jerk when you kissed him or took off his crown. I honestly remember my dad's wife showing me that (she introduced me to these adventure games) and I haven't found any proof that "actually happened" ... is there any way you could help me with this mystery? Or am I just experiencing the "the Mandela effect"?
Hi Roses! I love that you reviewed so many games in the King's Quest series. I will check soon to see if you have already but I have a suggestion. You should make a playlist of all your King's Quest reviews!
I played KGIV a lot as a kid and never beat it as I got stuck on a lot of its puzzles. I even wrote to Sierra for hints and I'm pretty sure that a couple of times Roberta Williams wrote me back.
@PushingUpRoses I totally thought, when you said at 0:25 "It was also the first in the series to have a mouth" --- as you showed the inside of the whale's mouth. LOL
My favourite of the King's Quest series was always KQ3 growing up, but even still, I have to admit that KQ4 was such an improvement in pretty much every way. It looked and sounded beautiful, (I own the SCI version) and the story had real emotions and stakes. The haunted house ghost quests really had an impact on me as a kid. I think the only thing that stops KQ4 from being higher up in my list is the 'puzzle' (term used loosely) to get the bridle. That drove me nuts to the point I had to buy the stupid Hint Book with the little red view finder, just for that one solution. Kids who grew up with the internet always being a thing have no clue how frustrating it could get being a gamer during the classic Sierra period. As always I love your reviews of these amazing games, it always fills me with a warm sense of nostalgia.
I feel like one of the weirdest thing you can anonymously to a content creator is "I've been thinking about you"...and here we are. I was thinking about you and poof. Review in my sub box. Good job, universe.
My fav part of this game is when you kiss the Frog Prince, turning him human but since you're dressed like a peasant, he's all stuck-up and leaves saying you're beneath him.
Hi Roses, just wanted to ask if you've played the Runaway series (i'm sure you have)? I ask because Runaway - A Road Adventure is the first adventure game i ever played and it got me interested in the genre, now my favorite game is Grim Fandango and before Runaway it was probably Call of Duty :D. just wanted to ask what you thought of the series (i already know how you feel about Grim Fandango :) ) and if you're planning on reviewing them as well someday?
It was a really fun, if frustrating, game. I've never finished it. Even if I still had the instruction booklet, I doubt I'd have been able to finish it. I think maybe it was too hard for me at the time.
What's even better than forgetting the fruit is getting it, and then you eat it yourself. By the time I found it I had no memory of why I might want it and so tried everything eventually deciding that eating it must give me some kind of magical protection. Ooops.
Have ever done a video on the Chzo Mythos series (5 Days a Stranger, 7 Days a Skeptic, Trilby's Notes, 6 Days a Sacrifice)? They seem to be in your line of work, as they're a series of spoopy adventure games.
Out of all the KQ games this was the first one i played with the text partial system and the keyboard. It felt very alien to me but i got through it was a good experience though I still loathed the staires, the dark cave, and that path way to lolotte's castle can flark right off because the pathway programing is broken you can actually just fall for no reason. I went on to playing the keyboard space quest and other kings quest games but only few of those i've beaten, I'm not that big of a fan of the keyboard controls plus i get carpal cramps which is very annoying so i mostly play the fan remakes with point n click controls.
As a wee lass, the unicorn was why I played the game, the creepy ass troll was why I stopped. I finally played the game all the way through a few years back and was also relieved when Rosella turned down a proposal from someone she had literally only met twice. Although she had to think about it. :/
A note to anyone who has played this a bunch and might be looking for something to spruce up their next play-through, check out the "Ultimate King's Quest 4 with Amiga Sounds and MUNT" installer here: sierrahelp.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=3925 (end of the first post of the thread). You will (as noted) need some MT-32 ROMs (or I guess an MT-32 and some DOSBOX config rewriting), but the combination of the Amiga atmospheric sounds and the MT-32 music is pretty magical. (note that installer requires a copy of King's Quest 4. It should work fine with any of the SCI versions, I've only tested it with the GOG version though because I'm lazy. I'm pretty sure the person who wrote that patch tested it better than I did though.)
Kings Quest IV was that one game that myself, sister and cousins played but never finished until way later (when it came out again on CD and everyone had a sound card.) The only thing you didn't mention was the copy-protection method. (KQ1-2 used a disk-based copy protection, 3 having the spellbook which acted as protection, 4 used the manual, 5 and 6 also had things from the manual.) When DOSBOX got MT-32 support, I played the entire game again, and like wow that sure makes the previous adlib and pc-speaker/tandy-3voice (on ye old 8088 Tandy 1000) to shame.
Man, I love it when people tell me I didn't mention something as if I somehow didn't realize it. ;) I will be discussing KQ copy protection in a separate video.
Boo to the copyright protection. I remember losing my manual, too, when we moved a couple of times. Yes, it was a total bummer. :( As a result of trying to "break in" to the game using just one word, to this DAY "kingdom" is the fastest word I can type. :-p
+PushingUpRoses I'm looking forward to that one - not for long of course, I'll forget all about it until it shows up, but *then* there'll be much rejoicing! :) I much prefer the King's Quest 3, 5 & 6 method of having to deal with it once somewhere in game and tying it to the story. Roberta making me Look up a word in manual before I start every time is annoying and not so creative. But that feeling of being locked out when you loose the documents (before internet archiving); maybe it's better to get it over and not even taste the game, but I appreciated wandering the Green Isles and Serenia before the story came to a screeching halt - you never know when it will happen in King's Quest 5 - the brigands, the witch, the rope or the boat with the ending just within reach. I'm sure Sierra reckoned that pirates would more likely buy the game if they're allowed to play most of it, and then *Denied* - though any smart pirate knew you had to pay for a xerox of the manual, or a xerox of the xerox until you can barely decipher it, lol!
We would always get new Kings Quest games for our birthdays as kids when they were released. True story... we found the freaking bridle after days of searching by resorting to going to each screen, walking around and typing take bridle. Not sure how you are supposed to find that damn thing without hints it wasn't even on screen if I recall correctly.
Somewhere around my house, I STILL have this (plus manual). I'm sure that - if I dug long enough - I could find it. I dunno if my PC would run it though.
I played this game a lot just because the lead was a girl like me. This and Jill of the Jungle were my favorites! I didn't beat it until I was almost 30, though. Were there really over 70 songs? Thinking back I guess there were, but I didn't realize there were that many!
KQ4 was one of the first PC games I ever saw...a true classic, although both I and my friend who owned it were disappointed that typing "undress" didn't work, lol.
I recommend watching Pawdugans KingsQuest retrospectives. He has PUR featured in his retrospective vids which is really cool. PUR really knows her Kings Quest Trivia so well.
It's the stairs that frustrated me and I can't help but think of them whenever I come across circular stairs in a video game such as Skyrim. Part of the fun was how you just kept hitting a wall until you figured out a puzzle though I can't see that as fun now, the number of times I wound up married to Edgar was embarrassing. This game circulated through the office and many people including the girls at the office couldn't get pass the bag of diamonds and the mine to get the lantern till I pointed out that you were role playing as a sweet young girl so you would want to return the purse. Even the women co-workers all said they just wanted to keep the diamonds for themselves so they never thought of that. Crawling up the whale's tongue diagonally was ridiculous but par for the course for video games of the time. They should do a higher resolution version of the game perhaps in a modern 3d game engine. The play on gender roles is dated now but revolutionary at the time and quite frankly, I find this game to be one of the most memorable of the era.
When I was around 10 or 11, I received my big bro's hand-me-down Tandy along with a BIG box of Sierra games. I had never even heard of Sierra prior to getting those amazing treasures. The very first game I went for was King's Quest IV. Why?? Because I'm a girl and I had NEVER seen a heroine before take the lead in a game! I was enamored. To this DAY I still think back on this game fondly. Although the rest of the King's Quest series certainly doesn't pale in comparison. What a series! I would recommend it to anyone who hasn't played!
I think you mean the rest of the series pales in comparison...meaning, they aren't as good
@@DerekEvans1013 no, I meant what I said. I loved part four but I live for the entire series ((except the dreaded part 8 🤢)).
Weird that Genesta can sense if Rosella forgot the fruit, yet still sends her home anyway. Couldn't she just teleport over to the swamp and get it for her?
You: doing the King’s Quest retrospective’s out of order
Me from the future: it’s quite simply not a problem for 3D chess players
This was my first King's Quest game. I remember how lethal the stairs were well. They taught me to save scum hard.
Then I learned to make many save files after I saved in an unwinnable state.
That whale puzzle was the bane of my existence as a kid. Even visits to the Sierra forums were of no help, since no one mentioned that you had to be captured by Lolotte before the whale would even appear.
I do like this game a lot of the atmosphere and innovations in technology and storytelling, but it was the one that most grated on me in my recent replay of the series. All those trial and error stairways, narrow paths, and unavoidable troll in the caves really left a bad taste in my mouth.
One thing I did notice was how much shady business Rosella had to do on Lolotte's behalf, and how the game rewards you for undoing it after she is dead (releasing the unicorn, returning the scarab to the tomb, etc). It's a nice little touch and one I completely missed playing this as a kid.
your username & avi are incredible, whooo!
"Tamir" in Hebrew (and some other ME languages) means "hidden"... gotta wonder if they used Tolkien's style of playing on real languages in their fantasy world. Either way, one of my favorite series ever! 💙👍
At the time, it was the largest computer game written with over 1.5MB of code! (literally a selling point on the game box)
"Sometimes, you just need to be eaten by a large man and then all your dreams come true..." ~ PushingUpRoses
I just finished playing this game (as in today). First time I had touched it in close to twenty years! Forgot how brutal and unforgiving these games can be at times, but it's well worth it for the quality.
The entire King's Quest Collection is up on Steam for only 20 bucks!
Genesta is Rosella's Tyler Durden
I used to play the old AGI games on a Tandy 1000. 3 voice music was quite nice.
This was actually the first point n click I ever got to play, a neighbor had it when I was young. I still remember turning into a frog and the text box "POOF! You're a little froggy!"
Roses I have to say, your editing is looking very good. After this video I can say your among the best editions we have in UA-cam. 10/10
Text parser based graphic adventure games should make a comeback! I find them way more immersive than point & click games. The very first graphic adventure game I played and which got me into the genre as a kid was Simon the Sorcerer, a P&C graphic adventure.
Only last year I was finally in a state of mind which enabled me to tackle the earlier Sierra games, such as KQ 1-4 and Space Quest 1-3. I would never have thought I'd be able to get into them, but turns out it's been an awesome experience discovering and playing these games for the very first time. Wish there were either more of them or I could erase my memory and experience them for the first time again. :(
This was actually one of the firs KQ games I played and I loved it. "Climb tree" "You're not that kind of girl Rosella!"
These games really do seem like a fairy tale come to life. The art style, story, and especially that soundtrack. It's amazing to me as a composer just how much character they really could create with such a limited technology. Creation through constraint, indeed.
Yeah, that version of Greensleeves was pretty bad... BUT it was still enough to save a special place in my heart for that song. So much that I demanded that at one point during my wedding, I insisted that Greensleeves be played before the ceremony begun. My wife wasn't too thrilled when she learned where my love for that song came from and she realized that music from a video game had been played at her wedding. I still don't see anything wrong with that. This is my favorite King's Quest game. KQ2 was my first PC game, but KQ4 was my favorite of the series.
King's Quest 4 has to be one of the better King's Quest, it still has its problems design wise and is filled with deaths but over all it comes out near the top of the series in my opinion.
I think it's probably the second best after Kings Quest VI, despite the design improvements of KQV.
But the first Kings Quest game I played was VII, so that explains why I was strangely drawn to it when I got Kings Quest Collection.
One of my favorite things about the old sierra games was the deaths. Too much hand holding in the new adventure games.
As I recall, the original release of King's Quest (on self-booting floppy) featured a consistent "chirping" sound throughout the game, which was absent in later releases.
I loved Kings Quest games so much. IV is epecially nostalgic for me, as I used to play it with my mother (well she would play it and I would 'help' sometimes as my spelling at age 8 was not great lol) and I think it was probably one of the first games I ever encountered with a woman protagonist. I went back recently to play it on an emulator and felt it held up. These games just...meant a lot and I'm glad to see someone talking about them! Also I love your channel in general! Glad to have found it!
This is one of my favorite game. And I enjoyed playing it when I was young
When you mentioned how this game had many 1st's, I thought one of the main game release introductions would be the fact that this is the 1st Sierra game created with the SCI engine which I am so thankful for and ill be honest pre SCI releases I have never been crazy about and since I was born in '88 a lot of Sierra games before late '92 I did not experience during their contemporary distribution era
The whale...THE WHALE! How I was confounded by that whale. ...then I found out that you don't need to climb to the center of the tongue. You just want to reach the top so you can walk over to the uvula. Huh. Also, Space Quest reference in a bottle, LOL.
I was never able to get through the game, but the setting and the house cleaning (not kidding) made this is one of the adventure games I love the most. I love VI and VII as well. The King's quest series was filled with bollocks puzzles and some garbage design, but I still cherish the games so, so much.
I'm so happy that there are content creators like you out there showing these games to the world so many years later.
Finally, your video acted as a reminder that there as in fact an AGI version of KQ4. I kept forgetting to look it up, but as soon as you showed it on screen I went looking. And I found it! Looks awesome! AGI FTW!
I think you're spot on about the sombre mood of this game. I came to King's Quest as a kid with II, then III which blew my mind with the time/spell element and then I got IV when I was 9, a bit after it came out. The music and everything just really blew my mind and I admit, at the time, I found it a terribly emotionally involving game. I hate to admit that now--as an adult and as someone who has played the more recent games, that probably wouldn't be true, but... I also found the transition to night terribly spooky, even genuinely scary (did I mention I scared *really* easily as a kid? I'd have nightmares from seeing a Nightmare on Elm Street video cover...)
One of my faves of the series. Got it for Xmas one year and played all school break mostly during a blizzard. Hadn't heard the MT-32 soundtrack until now, it's quite nice (I had one of the FM cards).
This was one of the King's Quest games I didn't play until my late teens, when I got the King's Quest Complete Collection, and thank God I didn't play it as a child. Nighttime in Tamir is genuinely creepy, and I died more than my fair share of times. I do love it though, and it makes me love Rosella (who I only knew previously from King's Quest VII).
Sierra games always came with a little catalogue of their other games and I remember thinking that the screenshots of KQ4 were just mind blowing. Still looks good!
Big thanks for naming that King’s Quest I title song. Been wondering about that one.
0:37 Water is excellent
Not only was this my first King's Quest games, but the first PC game I ever played. My sister and I spent months finishing the game without a walkthrough. Such great memories.
I LOVED playing this game back when it came out. I remember experiencing some hilarious glitches like being able to walk in the sky on the path scene to Lolotte's castle, and the troll in the dark cave being frozen and doesn't chase you.
@Roses - Really glad you reviewed this one - This is my all-time favourite KQ game (and possibly favourite Sierra game overall). It has always blown me away with it's rich, fairy-tale and folklore world, it's many puzzles - some really good ones, it's range of characters... dammit there's so much. The haunted house, with the ghosts and the zombies in the graveyard outside, is by far my favourite section of any KQ game, to this day I still love it.
KQ4 feels much more like a "solid" adventure game (the first two were okay but kinda 'bitty' in places), and whilst it has the odd minor moment of humour is indeed more serious over the goofier early ones (heck, the Batmobile ven cames racing out of a cave in I think KQ2!) I also personally feel it's one of those games that benefits for the text input in terms of scope for exploring and experimenting. As with all Sierra games there is lots of saving, learning-by-error and points where if you don't have right items in some places you're stuffed and have to restore, but meh, that's part of Sierra. Yes that dark cave was terrible (I actually thought when originally playing it that I had missed something either in it or something to make it easier... nope) and yes I spent AGES trying to climb up that damned whale's tongue!
Whilst KQ6 and, for it's drawbacks (hoot) KQ5 are too classics, in my view this is THE best King's Quest game and a wistful memory of the golden age of adventure games.
(Oh and if you don't like He-Man haircuts I'm kinda stuffed really. BTW, would really love some similar Space Quest reviews) :)
Ditto. That whale tongue, though. Soooo hard.
I'm so glad I found your channel :) AWESOME content. It's a treasure trove for showcasing games I love and grew up with! Finalllyyy. This is a cozy corner of youtube. And the presentation is 10/10, so fun and entertaining. I'm literally giddy over all this. YAY.
This was the game I was looking for. 20 years in the back of my head
I wish AGD would remake this one too.
Regarding dithering I wonder how that looked back then, if colors were blended like on old consoles? That would make the technique look better, especially on a larger monitor.
It pretty much always looked badly dithered, at least if you were using a VGA monitor (as I was at the time). Perhaps a little bit better than it looks with modern, upscaled LCD displays, but nothing like the noise/blending you'd get with an RF or composite TV connection like you'd find with old consoles (low-rent anti-aliasing, as I used to call it). Much older games, written for CGA graphics (as opposed to later EGA or VGA graphics) were frequently designed to be displayed on television or CGA monitors with a composite video cable, and you would get the blending effect on those (and it typically looked far better than the sickly pinkish hue you'd get with backwards-compatible EGA/VGA displays), but that wouldn't apply to _King's Quest IV_, which uses EGA graphics.
I played it on a Commodore Amiga with a CRT, and it looked pretty good. These days you can use SCUMMVM to translate the dither patterns into actual colors.
Unicorn Tales is working on a 3D remake of KQ4. It's been difficult, since the tragic passing of our founder, but we are still working on it.
Roses , I blame you for buying the humble bundle of Sierra adventure games. I know the decision was mine, and all that, but your videos about King's Quest have influenced me. They are great and your channel is great. Keep the good work!
I'm surprised you didn't mention the randomness of the cave troll!
It has to be the most unnerving stressful moment in the whole game. Gotta hate unscripted moments like that. It's like those random deaths in Gold Rush, another Sierra game.
But all in all, I love KQ4 as much as you do. Roberta Williams' badly digitized face when you expire has to be the scariest thing in the whole game, though.
I love this game!
It's frustrating, it makes me angry sometimes... But man, the journey is just soo damn special, I don't think I'll ever forget this game. ^^
The game allows you to use the mouse for point and click movement.
And then puts a thousand and one narrow paths to make you fall off when Rosella just walks in a straight line wherever you click.
Ah, the memories of tapping the directional arrows slowly just to move up some simple stairs...
Classic game! My dad and I always agreed that this was the best in the series. I love 3 and 6 as well but Rosella has a special place in my heart.
Hope you cover Conquests of Camelot at some point. My all time nostalgia rose tinted favourite Sierra adventure.
This was the first king's Quest game I played, and I was inspired by you to play it!
I started playing all the King's Quest games after picking up the Sierra bundle. I while I was very impressed with the first one, just considering the time it came out, IV was the first one that really blew me away. All the animation and music was much improved from III and they added a bunch of dialogue scenes. Pretty cool! Also Rosella is awesome in this one. I liked playing her in VII, but she was a bit too whiny, at least at the beginning.
Graham wasn´z playing who is the favoruite child. The scene with his hat is more likely to celebrate their future, hoping they will have great aventures as he had, that is why he passes the hat on to this children.
This is still my favorite King's Quest title out of the five I've played. I remember being so excited finding it at the mall as a kid and begging my mom to buy it for me, lol.
That grave-digging part with the shovel breaking is complete bullsht.
Hello PushingUpRoses, it's been a real pleasure watching your reviews of these great Sierra Games. I also played these games out of order - without a strategy guide or calling the 900 Sierra help line (wow phone bills back then). I played II, III, I, then IV, V and the last one I played in the series was VI, then I moved onto Police Quest, Space Quest, and eventually Man Hunter (which I never completed - I was lost). I am reaching out because I can't seem to find "ANY PROOF" of one of my childhood memories about this specific Kings Quest Game ... and I have searched ever place I can think of online. So maybe you know this:
In the beginning of this story (aka the Intro cut scene) I remember the player having a choice of being disguised by Genesta. If you chose not to be disguised then the Frog Prince wasn't such a jerk when you kissed him or took off his crown. I honestly remember my dad's wife showing me that (she introduced me to these adventure games) and I haven't found any proof that "actually happened" ... is there any way you could help me with this mystery? Or am I just experiencing the "the Mandela effect"?
My favourite part of the KQ series was the fairy-tale and mythological references they made.
Hi Roses! I love that you reviewed so many games in the King's Quest series. I will check soon to see if you have already but I have a suggestion. You should make a playlist of all your King's Quest reviews!
I played KGIV a lot as a kid and never beat it as I got stuck on a lot of its puzzles. I even wrote to Sierra for hints and I'm pretty sure that a couple of times Roberta Williams wrote me back.
I loved this game growing up, dear god is the whale a pain in the ass though.
This is it, the one I was looking for, as soon as I saw Pan playing at flute I knew it.
You had me at Unicorn.
Props for the subtle Rocky Horror quote at the end there :)
@PushingUpRoses I totally thought, when you said at 0:25 "It was also the first in the series to have a mouth" --- as you showed the inside of the whale's mouth. LOL
Great explanation of dithering
My favourite of the King's Quest series was always KQ3 growing up, but even still, I have to admit that KQ4 was such an improvement in pretty much every way. It looked and sounded beautiful, (I own the SCI version) and the story had real emotions and stakes. The haunted house ghost quests really had an impact on me as a kid.
I think the only thing that stops KQ4 from being higher up in my list is the 'puzzle' (term used loosely) to get the bridle. That drove me nuts to the point I had to buy the stupid Hint Book with the little red view finder, just for that one solution. Kids who grew up with the internet always being a thing have no clue how frustrating it could get being a gamer during the classic Sierra period. As always I love your reviews of these amazing games, it always fills me with a warm sense of nostalgia.
I feel like one of the weirdest thing you can anonymously to a content creator is "I've been thinking about you"...and here we are. I was thinking about you and poof. Review in my sub box. Good job, universe.
Think about her more often - I don't have that power. :[
Edgar awkwardly walks away after being rejected. "I thought I had it." he says to himself. "But I had the power..."
He's gonna have to talk this one out with the Sorceress afterward.
Also there’s a unicorn! 😊
Ahh the game that made me so want to play Sierra adventures more than any other. Then I played it. The desire went away pretty much. :(
My fav part of this game is when you kiss the Frog Prince, turning him human but since you're dressed like a peasant, he's all stuck-up and leaves saying you're beneath him.
Hi Roses, just wanted to ask if you've played the Runaway series (i'm sure you have)? I ask because Runaway - A Road Adventure is the first adventure game i ever played and it got me interested in the genre, now my favorite game is Grim Fandango and before Runaway it was probably Call of Duty :D. just wanted to ask what you thought of the series (i already know how you feel about Grim Fandango :) ) and if you're planning on reviewing them as well someday?
It was a really fun, if frustrating, game. I've never finished it. Even if I still had the instruction booklet, I doubt I'd have been able to finish it. I think maybe it was too hard for me at the time.
What's even better than forgetting the fruit is getting it, and then you eat it yourself. By the time I found it I had no memory of why I might want it and so tried everything eventually deciding that eating it must give me some kind of magical protection. Ooops.
Have ever done a video on the Chzo Mythos series (5 Days a Stranger, 7 Days a Skeptic, Trilby's Notes, 6 Days a Sacrifice)? They seem to be in your line of work, as they're a series of spoopy adventure games.
Hey Roses would you consider doing an LP for KQ4? Because I would be totally down for that.
I swear you're a mind reader. I was JUST playing this a few weeks ago and wished you'd review it.
What even are you?
Out of all the KQ games this was the first one i played with the text partial system and the keyboard.
It felt very alien to me but i got through it was a good experience though I still loathed the staires, the dark cave, and that path way to lolotte's castle can flark right off because the pathway programing is broken you can actually just fall for no reason.
I went on to playing the keyboard space quest and other kings quest games but only few of those i've beaten, I'm not that big of a fan of the keyboard controls plus i get carpal cramps which is very annoying so i mostly play the fan remakes with point n click controls.
This was the first video game I ever played! I sucked HARD at it, but so many memories! ❤️🖤❤️🖤
personally I am into he-man haircuts so Edgar is okay with me
As a wee lass, the unicorn was why I played the game, the creepy ass troll was why I stopped. I finally played the game all the way through a few years back and was also relieved when Rosella turned down a proposal from someone she had literally only met twice. Although she had to think about it. :/
Good evening, Roses!
Yet another great video, as usual. Never really played any of the KQ games, but your vids always get me interested in the series.
i screwed over a neighbor's work phone with free long distance just to finish this game on Sierra's cheat chat.
Top 3 for me!
A note to anyone who has played this a bunch and might be looking for something to spruce up their next play-through, check out the "Ultimate King's Quest 4 with Amiga Sounds and MUNT" installer here: sierrahelp.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=3925 (end of the first post of the thread). You will (as noted) need some MT-32 ROMs (or I guess an MT-32 and some DOSBOX config rewriting), but the combination of the Amiga atmospheric sounds and the MT-32 music is pretty magical. (note that installer requires a copy of King's Quest 4. It should work fine with any of the SCI versions, I've only tested it with the GOG version though because I'm lazy. I'm pretty sure the person who wrote that patch tested it better than I did though.)
Oh crud, I just realized I never finished this one. Well, I know what I'm doing this weekend.
Have fun :D
Kings Quest IV was that one game that myself, sister and cousins played but never finished until way later (when it came out again on CD and everyone had a sound card.) The only thing you didn't mention was the copy-protection method. (KQ1-2 used a disk-based copy protection, 3 having the spellbook which acted as protection, 4 used the manual, 5 and 6 also had things from the manual.)
When DOSBOX got MT-32 support, I played the entire game again, and like wow that sure makes the previous adlib and pc-speaker/tandy-3voice (on ye old 8088 Tandy 1000) to shame.
Man, I love it when people tell me I didn't mention something as if I somehow didn't realize it. ;) I will be discussing KQ copy protection in a separate video.
Boo to the copyright protection. I remember losing my manual, too, when we moved a couple of times. Yes, it was a total bummer. :( As a result of trying to "break in" to the game using just one word, to this DAY "kingdom" is the fastest word I can type. :-p
+PushingUpRoses I'm looking forward to that one - not for long of course, I'll forget all about it until it shows up, but *then* there'll be much rejoicing! :)
I much prefer the King's Quest 3, 5 & 6 method of having to deal with it once somewhere in game and tying it to the story. Roberta making me Look up a word in manual before I start every time is annoying and not so creative. But that feeling of being locked out when you loose the documents (before internet archiving); maybe it's better to get it over and not even taste the game, but I appreciated wandering the Green Isles and Serenia before the story came to a screeching halt - you never know when it will happen in King's Quest 5 - the brigands, the witch, the rope or the boat with the ending just within reach. I'm sure Sierra reckoned that pirates would more likely buy the game if they're allowed to play most of it, and then *Denied* - though any smart pirate knew you had to pay for a xerox of the manual, or a xerox of the xerox until you can barely decipher it, lol!
I remember when “soundblaster” was the all the rage
I replayed all the games just to hear the music.
We would always get new Kings Quest games for our birthdays as kids when they were released. True story... we found the freaking bridle after days of searching by resorting to going to each screen, walking around and typing take bridle. Not sure how you are supposed to find that damn thing without hints it wasn't even on screen if I recall correctly.
I'd love to see you do an LP of this, if you ever want to!
What's the name of the metal song you used? It's frickin' cool.
QUANTUMJOKER I'd love to know too!
FINALLY found it, it's called "Bet You Can" by Kevin MacLeod.
yay! Always wanted to see this one talked about.
KQ3 is my favorite. KQ4 is a close second. I've played both a ton. I honestly forgot that Rosella was questing to cure Graham's, er, whatever
Man I used to play this at the public library ALL the time!
Somewhere around my house, I STILL have this (plus manual). I'm sure that - if I dug long enough - I could find it. I dunno if my PC would run it though.
I played this game a lot just because the lead was a girl like me. This and Jill of the Jungle were my favorites! I didn't beat it until I was almost 30, though.
Were there really over 70 songs? Thinking back I guess there were, but I didn't realize there were that many!
This, Sim City, and The Scoop were the first three games that we had for PC if I recall correctly.
KQ4 was one of the first PC games I ever saw...a true classic, although both I and my friend who owned it were disappointed that typing "undress" didn't work, lol.
The "falling off the whale tongue" sound is bringing up some severe gaming PTSD...
I really need to play through this series some day.
i like all the KQ but KQ7 is my jam. if i remember right it had a share ware version of the incredible toon machine on the disc
I recommend watching Pawdugans KingsQuest retrospectives. He has PUR featured in his retrospective vids which is really cool. PUR really knows her Kings Quest Trivia so well.
Would you be able to tell me what the footage is from where Roberta is talking (4:40)? I haven't seen that before.
It's the stairs that frustrated me and I can't help but think of them whenever I come across circular stairs in a video game such as Skyrim. Part of the fun was how you just kept hitting a wall until you figured out a puzzle though I can't see that as fun now, the number of times I wound up married to Edgar was embarrassing. This game circulated through the office and many people including the girls at the office couldn't get pass the bag of diamonds and the mine to get the lantern till I pointed out that you were role playing as a sweet young girl so you would want to return the purse. Even the women co-workers all said they just wanted to keep the diamonds for themselves so they never thought of that. Crawling up the whale's tongue diagonally was ridiculous but par for the course for video games of the time. They should do a higher resolution version of the game perhaps in a modern 3d game engine. The play on gender roles is dated now but revolutionary at the time and quite frankly, I find this game to be one of the most memorable of the era.
I remember this was on 9 floppy disks and was the biggest game on our 20 megabyte hard drive
Is that haunted house the house from Hugo?
Ever play "Labyrinth: The Computer Game" (1986) for Apple II, Commodore 64 and MSX ?